Musicianship
by hauntful yay
Summary: The silent war between the Uchihas and the rest of the world had been going on a long time." AU, the clarinetist and the pianist. Enjoy!


The silent war between the Uchihas and the rest of the world had been going on a long time

No one knew who started it, and no one knew who would finish it. It would never be finished, was what some of the elders said. The youngers listened, but ignored the opinion. Selective hearing allows innocence to prevail, and why face troubles when you can avoid them? So the children played outside in the Uchiha compound, and inside of the tall fence with the alarms and the barbed wire the other children played too. Quietly though, and far behind the front lines. Their parents had whispered it so, and the children knew selective hearing only worked to a point.

Still, everyone pretended things were normal with the children, because innocence and selective hearing are valuable things, and each child still went to school, still suffered the loneliness and the success, and still played music. For music was required from fifth grade, and had been for generations, and if the music ever stopped, the world would be over. Naruto Uzumaki had been playing for twenty years.

He had begun as a normal student, if a slow one at that, but as he was still a child, he was offered an instrument. He was the last one in the line though, because he couldn't pay as an orphan. The charity kids were always last, and Naruto watched as each kid left with a sparkling trumpet, or a smooth violin. So when Naruto finally looked into the closet, all he saw was an empty room, filled with past shine and smell and emptiness. In the corner though, in the corner was a clarinet. The polish was worn, the horn was missing, and there was no reed. He took it.

He couldn't pay for a teacher, but he learned through watching others. Year after year he'd hide and listen as different teachers talked and played and taught and got paid. He'd wait in the shadows, and when the sun had gone down he'd take his little clarinet and his stolen reed, and he'd play. He'd pucker his mouth and smile downwards and bite and blow and eventually he got a note.

Naruto Uzumaki was the best player the rest of the world had ever had.

…

Sasuke Uchiha was swept into the world of music before he could talk. His mother and his father were professionals—they had avoided the war with their music, and grown rich because of it. They could afford to play lullabies to Sasuke every night with the rich tones of Mozart, and during the day as well. They could afford to buy the best piano the Uchihas had ever made in their long history. And they could afford to teach Sasuke, night and day, beginning the day he turned three.

Sasuke could never remember a day when he hadn't played. He'd graduated from keyboard to electric, to upright to grand. The piano was his life, and his parents pushed and pushed and pushed. He was to be a soloist someday, so his mother documented each song and recorded it, so someday when he was famous they'd have an archive. His father wrote his biography as his life went along. Sasuke just played.

Years passed, and more years. Sasuke was twenty five by the time he was deemed a master. He could play any song that was put in front of him, he could accompany player he'd never heard of. Sasuke knew composers, knew players, knew the whole history of musicians in the Uchiha clan. He hardly ever heard there was a war on, because his ears were full with music. His fingers danced on the keys and soldiers came to see him. He never saw them though, because the notes played in front of his eyes and he had no time for anything but.

Sasuke was the best player the Uchihas had ever had.

…

The day Sasuke went near the wall was one he would always remember. The wall was his protection, and beyond it lay only blackness. He wouldn't have even been out here, except his piano was being changed. He was getting another grand from the darkness today. He hoped it would be good, because the gunshots he heard here were grating.

Naruto was playing when he saw the piano go by that morning. It was a beauty—just because he played clarinet didn't mean he didn't know instruments. Even his clarinet, the one he had saved up for years to buy, wasn't as nice as the piano. So, playing softly for his ears alone, he followed the piano along through winding pathways and nearer and nearer to the cannons. They turned at the last moment though, and a line of a path he had never seen before appeared. It led to a gate in the wall, and Naruto almost froze, aghast. The piano was going to the Uchihas.

When Sasuke pulled open the gate, the first thing he saw was the piano. It was beautiful, and as it was wheeled in, the wheeler dressed all in black was gone before Sasuke could even thank him. The gate swished closed behind him as well, though Sasuke was sure he was sunlight. He frowned lightly, but overlooked it. Here was the piano. Pulling it closer, Sasuke perched on the chair where he was and began to play. It was beautiful, beautifuller than any he had ever heard. Sasuke sat down completely and put his foot on the pedal. This would play Chopin like none had ever before.

The black man had flitted in and out through the gate almost before he could be seen, but Naruto was not as skilled as he was for nothing. He was in the shadows before anyone could blink, and as a rush of air passed him, Naruto sighed lightly and began to play for himself. It was comforting, as was the sound of the piano that reached him was as smooth as twilight. _Wait, piano?_ Naruto's head turned, and he listened incredulously as the sound slid over the wall and to him. Chopin. Naruto looked around carefully, and hearing nothing but the distant screams, crept closer.

Sasuke was playing as only he could. The sounds of the battle were lost to him, but the shots occasionally kept his beat when his tapping foot failed. Leaning slightly with his eyes closed, he played the piece he had known from childhood. Here was the B section, and here was the A, and here was the clarinet solo he had always longed to hear spiraling above his accompaniment. Switching his playing accordingly, Sasuke lost the solo line and listened to someone who could keep up with him. _Wait, someone?_

Naruto was amazed at himself. Here he was, hearing a piano from the darkness over the wall, and he was playing back. Soothing his heart's frantic palpitations, his eyes widened when he heard the reply. His heart speeding up again, Naruto almost stopped playing. But that was the golden rule—never stop when you're playing duet. And he was playing duet now, with the undulating chords from the beautiful piano backing off to let his sound soar.

The two of them were the best players the world had ever had.

…

Day after day turned into month after month, and soon Sasuke left his piano where it was, just next to the front lines, though miles away from the fighting. He covered it with a sheet and knew it didn't deserve the treating it was getting, but he didn't care and lied to his parents that it hadn't come though. He practiced duets now, at home on his old grand, playing the harmony line as well as the melody, so that everyone was confused but no one asked. Sasuke liked it that way, and walked to his piano every morning to play with the player of the darkness.

Naruto rose into the crescendo once again on his and his player's newest piece, something he had composed himself. Backing off slightly, a slightest pause was the only indication his pianist was improvising, and soon a d7 chord cut the air in a swirl of color. Naruto pressed into it slightly, and the other pressed back, pulling the melody into a glorious trio. By the finale he was panting. Smiling to himself, he walked away once again from his silent Uchiha, swiping a rag through his instrument. Someday he'd know which, and someday he'd know why the piano was there every morning. But today wasn't that day, and so on either side of the wall the musicians walked away to their lives.

…

The war was still on, and Sasuke and Naruto still played. By now they knew each other by heart, and each time a piece was invented, the other invented the rest of it before the first had even begun. Listeners gathered now on either side, silent to the music the two of them created. They never clapped though—the musicians made sure of it. And everyday at noon they left, and the crowds followed and dispersed.

Still, not every day was the same. Sasuke's piano, flushed by wind and cold, could eventually not support his light fingers any longer. It fell apart in his hands, and on the other side Naruto screeched to a halt as his player stopped playing. A C was heard, and then an E—but then it too fell sharp and Naruto knew it was time. He'd get to see his dueter as a new piano was made, because the Uchihas could not make pianos for the life of them and they knew it.

The piano was made, but the crowds had left once again as Naruto nor Sasuke appeared for weeks. Thus Naruto was once again alone as he followed the man in black, pushing the beautiful piano past the war zone and the hungry people. The man moved even faster than last time, but Naruto had no trouble keeping up. He played softly to himself, remembering when he had gotten a new instrument too, and waited in the shadows as the gate was once again open.

Sasuke held the door open this time. Yes, there was sunlight. Yes, there were plants. In fact, his darkness looked exactly the same as his own home. He frowned as the man in black pushed his piano in and reached for the gate. He stepped in, slightly, and the man in black wrenched harder. But Sasuke did not have pianist fingers for nothing. He pulled back, and the man stopped struggling. From behind his back stepped a figure with a clarinet.

Naruto had never known what the land behind the wall looked like. What he saw surprised him though—a young man with jet black hair and coal eyes, glaring as he had never seen anyone glare before, and standing in front of three pianos, each as run-down as the other. Naruto held his clarinet loosely, and watched the expressions pass along the man's face as he recognized the instrument.

"Hello," Naruto said, watching the man in black step away, knowing he was defeated. "I'm Naruto."

"Sasuke." The man said back, and tilted his head slightly.

"I'm an Uchiha."

"I'm from the rest of the world."

They looked at each other once again, and when Sasuke looked up he saw it was morning. The gunshots were still firing, and the gate was still open. He stepped back to his new piano, and watched Naruto do the same. They joined each other in the gap between the walls, and Sasuke slowly placed his hands across the keys. Naruto's reed went to his mouth, and soon the man in black was accompanied by the rest of the world. The Uchihas came as the watch for the dueters music was called. The first note was played.

And between the wall, with people on either side looking across to each other, the two played Chopin. The gunshots still fired the beat, and Sasuke and Naruto still closed their eyes to the sound of each other. The war was still on.

But the two of them were still the best musicians that the world had ever known.

…

A/N—You know, this is inspired from a movie we watched in band. Some kid was actually put through what Sasuke was put though, and a really famous player got to look in the closet for whatever was left. Tell me what you think! hauntful yay


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